


A Cabal of Scones and Wine

by Vera (Vera_DragonMuse)



Series: Durin's Auto Body [5]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-14
Updated: 2014-01-14
Packaged: 2018-01-08 18:36:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1136053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vera_DragonMuse/pseuds/Vera
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The ties that bind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Cabal of Scones and Wine

They’d call each other sisterwives, but the term was already taken and sort of creepy. There wasn’t another term readily on hand for women who were excellent friends married to brothers and everyone in each other’s business so much of the time. Fili had more than once suggested that they just buy one house. 

“Kili in our kitchen. Every morning.” Sigrid would inevitably reply and Fili would subside faster than a wave going back to sea. 

They weren’t in collusion against their husbands. There wasn’t a need for it. But sometimes it was nice to sit across the table with another woman, coffee cups pressed warm in their hands and bitch about inconsequential pains. A forgotten obligation. A miscommunication that ended in upset. 

“Have you ever woken up and seen him lying next you and just thought ‘I could kill you right now and no jury would convict me’?” Sigrid asked plaintively. “You don’t mean it, but...” 

“Once a year at least,” Tauriel laughed. “And no jury would be able to prove it.” 

“Then he wakes up and he’s all...him,” Sigrid snapped his fingers. “And it just disappears.” 

“Something to do with how boneless he is in the morning,” Tauriel sighed. “It’d be like kicking a puppy.”

There were times when it was probably too much. Too close, shoved up tight against each other, but that’s the way the Durins liked it. Everyone treading on each other’s toes and noses in each other’s business. Sigrid knew that Tauriel loved it, that it filled some unspoken void in her. Tauriel knew that Sigrid had grown up sharing a bedroom with her little sister, being her father’s confident and her brother’s champion. She would have withered in a family less tightly bound. 

But there were probably limits that they ignored and shouldn’t. Especially after too much wine when the boys were driving back from the city and bound to be late. Tauriel brought over the bottles and Sigrid fetched the glasses, starting with the best intentions and ending soused on the couch, their legs tangled up. 

“I can’t!” Sigrid looked utterly scandalized. 

“Is it good though?” Tauriel was laughing through tears. “I mean, Kili does these little licks and then they just build and it drives me nuts.” 

“Yes, yes,” Sigrid covered her face with a hand, “Fili does that and there’s this figure eight thing that should’ve stopped working years ago, but it’s just...perfect. Especially when he starts...you know.” 

“Wait,” Tauriel stopped laughing at all at once. “You mean he does little licks, figure eight and then starts with the fingers?” 

“Nearly every time. It’s like he memorized what works and he can actually do it in his sleep,” Sigrid frowned. “Why?” 

“That’s it exactly. Exactly how Kili does it.” 

They stared at each other in dawning horror. With the absolute worst timing in the universe, the front door crashed open and Kili flew by at mockspeed, the bathroom door closing with a slam and the word ‘SADIST!” cracking through the air. 

“You should’ve gone at the rest stop, asshole!” Fili was yelling after him as he came through the front door. He managed to hang up his coat before he turned to find both women glaring at him. “Um. Hi?” 

“Did you teach your brother how to go down on a woman?” Tauriel asked with enough chill to start another ice age. 

“What? How? Why?” Fili flushed an instant heated red. “What?” 

“He was eighteen!” Tauriel groaned. “You...how could you!” 

Kili banged back out of the bathroom, stilling as soon as he took in the temperature in the room. 

“It was his fault!” Fili pointed at him. “He got me drunk.” 

“What? No, I didn’t! I wouldn’t let you drive if-” 

“You liquored up your brother so he’d teach you cunnilingus?” Tauriel’s focus shifted to Kili, who held up both hands as if he could ward off the conversation with a gesture. 

“What is happening?” Kili hissed at Fili, who could no longer make eye contact with anyone in the room. 

“Oh my God,” Sigrid tucked herself small, aching in embarrassment. “I’m never going to orgasm again.” 

“Right,” Fili turned on his heels and went to the bedroom. “I’m going to bed.” 

The slamming of the door made them all wince. 

“It wasn’t like whatever you’re thinking,” Kili said quietly. “I wanted to be good for you.” 

“You were, you are,” the anger fled from Tauriel in an instant. “It’s just weird, I guess.” 

“Why?” Kili frowned. “It was good advice, wasn’t it? He even showed me on a half a peach once I got the rest of the vodka into him.” 

“Oh Jesus,” Sigrid sprung from the couch, abandoning her wine glass. 

She found Fili sitting on the edge of their bed in the dark. She sat down beside him, wrapped an arm around him. She could hear Tauriel and Kili talking the living room, the rise and fall of their voices. It was always a din with them, a shuffle of cards and a clink of wine glasses. Fili wasn’t like that, never had been. In the wake of Kili’s chaos, Fili was careful and often too quiet. It was a fault they shared. She knew how to wait for him though as he worked his way back to words.

“Who else was he going to ask?” He finally began, the dam bursting open. “His two best friends were gay and there was no one else he could trust. I taught him everything else, so it must’ve seemed like sure bet. I wasn’t even that drunk. It just seemed better to let him think I was.” 

“I just don’t understand why anyone had to say anything,” she kissed his shoulder, smelling the road on his clothes. “No one taught me and I figured it out.” 

“But weren’t you scared the first time?” His hand landed on her leg, curving over the delicate of her inner thigh. 

“Yes, a little.” 

“I was terrified,” he swallowed hard. “There was no one for me to get drunk and ask too many questions. I just had to piece it together. And really, I only sort of liked her. Kili was crazy for Tauriel. He kept telling me that it had to go well or he’d lose her. It was that first year they were together, when he thought she’d be off like a shot if anything happened. Fuck, I half-wanted it to happen then.” 

“Because you didn’t like her?” 

“Because it was my little brother. My dopey, shaggy, half-grown little brother, who sometimes forgot to turn off the stovetop before leaving the house and he was talking about marriage already,” Fili’s thumb ran circles over her thighs. “He was mine to keep safe and she was going to break his heart.” 

“She didn’t though.” 

“No,” Fili huffed a laugh. “Isn’t that life for you? We worry about all the wrong things.” 

“I shouldn’t have talked to Tauriel about our sex lives,” Sigrid sighed. “Sorry.” 

“Nah,” he kissed her cheek. “If not her, who? Think the whole point is that keeping it locked up didn’t do any good. Just maybe don’t ambush me about it, okay?” 

“Okay,” she pushed him down onto the bed, straddling his waist. “Is it weird that I want to watch you eat a peach now?” 

“I think that can be arranged,” Fili smiled up at her. 

In the morning, Tauriel and Kili were still on their couch, him draped over her and a blanket half-heartedly pulled over the both of them. The rest of the wine was gone and Tauriel’s hand dragged over the floor. 

“It’d be adorable if it wasn’t so horrifying,” Fili groaned and vanished into the kitchen. 

Sigrid would love to say that they swore off too many glasses of wine after that, but Tauriel always found cheap sweet bottles and sometimes, it was just the thing to sit with her in one of their living rooms and wind their way through the mazes of adulthood together. They were sisters after all, after a fashion. 

Fili and Kili did it too, in their own way. Peach and vodka incidents aside, they were unreasonably good to each other. Fili’s mix of paternal and fraternal affection rarely jarring with Kili’s boyish devotion. They ran their business through a series of conversations that were mostly half-sentences and gestures.

“My point is,” Fili would begin. 

“That you’re being ridiculous,” Kili would complete with a careless shrug. “Having to order a bit of extra stock isn’t going to bankrupt us.” 

“It’s taking up space.” 

“Were you planning a tea party back there?” 

“If I was, you’d be last on my invite list,” Fili grumbled. 

Then they’d order a foot long meatball sub and split it over a two liter bottle of Pepsi, passed between them like a cup. 

“We’re taking the fourth of July,” Fili decreed. “Sigrid and I are going to the beach.”

“Fine, Memorial Day for us then,” Kili was halfway into an engine. “There’s a trail I’ve been meaning to tackle.” 

The empty days where one held down the fort and the other was away should have been a blessing. 

Instead, Fili came home looking pensive and Sigrid’s welcome home kiss lasted a little longer than usual. 

“Bad day?” She asked. 

“No,” he shrugged and would say no more, but he sat with her while she watched television shows he usually ignored and fell asleep with his head on her lap.

Then there was Kili, who texted Tauriel in such volume and length that she stopped answering. 

“It’s probably fucked,” Kili told her when he got home. “Like I should see a professional, right?” 

“A professional what?” 

“A therapist?” 

“Huh,” she pulled herself up on the counter as he started to take vegetables out of the fridge. “Why?” 

“It’s...codependent?” He stabbed at the term. 

“No idea,” she tossed him an apple. “I’d worry more if you were like this when we were the ones who were away.” 

“Maybe.” 

And then there was inevitable. Sigrid came back from July fourth utterly normal, but it had already begun. It was Tauriel she called with a frantic, 

“Never tell Fili that I told you first, he’d never forgive me, but oh god oh god, Tee.” 

“You’ll be an amazing mother,” Tauriel made her a cup of tea and they stared at the pregnancy test. 

“I’m sorry,” Sigrid swallowed. “I shouldn’t have...with you all...” 

“It’s a choice. We could find ways,” Tauriel shrugged, used to the low pang in her belly at the thought. She hadn’t really wanted children, but it had stung to know that she couldn’t anyway. “Guess your kids will have to deal with having twice as many interfering adults in their lives.” 

When Fili called Kili, it was late and Tauriel feigned sleep as the brothers whispered over the phone in the dark. 

“Don’t be scared, Fi,” Kili said, infinitely gentle, “did alright by me, didn’t you?” 

and then, 

“It’ll be different. We’ll be different. We already are.” 

Tauriel made a point after that of corralling Fili in front of a NASCAR race, their shared obsession and redoing his messy braids. She didn’t mention the baby or parenting. Instead, they yelled at the television together and groaned through the commercials. It would be easy for Tauriel to remember those first years of stony indifference, when Fili had watched her writhe at family dinners like a butterfly on a pin. 

“The thing is,” he’d said when he made his apologies for those old wounds, “I didn’t know you. I didn’t want to know you. So. I was an idiot.” 

“Guess I didn’t try to know you either,” she conceded and that had been the end of it. 

Neither of them were grudge holders, in the end. After all, she’d robbed him early of his closest companion, something she couldn’t quite be sorry for, but understood a little better now. 

For his part, Kili was wildly ridiculously happy over Sigrid. From the first day Fili had introduced them, Kili had latched onto this fellow cook and they’d spent long hours in the kitchen, experimenting with messes. Now, with the baby on the way, their sessions saw Sigrid directing while Kili played exuberant sous chef. He brought her little offerings, ripe apples when all other foods turned her stomach, spices from the Chinese market in the next town and articles about a whole range of things clipped from shop’s waiting room magazines. 

“I think I’m the one meant to be spoiling her,” Fili protested as Kili produced a twist of wild daisies one afternoon. 

“Who’s stopping you?” Kili plopped the flowers into a half-empty bottle of water. 

“People think you want to sleep with her you know,” Fili ran a finger over one soft petal. 

“People are idiots, brother mine.” 

“Yeah,” Fili cuffed Kili gently upside the head, “they are.” 

As she gently rounded, Sigrid became a gravid center to their quartet. She’d always been the calmest in a crisis, but her passenger gave her quiet opinion greater weight somehow. Like at Dis’ fiftieth birthday party Thorin finally arrived with a date. The boys had exploded in apoplectic rage, old wounds ripped viciously open. It was Sigrid who put her hand to Ori’s elbow and led him into the kitchen. It was Sigrid, who brewed the coffee though she only used her mug to warm her hands. 

“This is what we do when they’re like this,” she explained. 

“And sometimes just because we want to or because Sigrid made scones or because Dis is eyeing us up for the kill,” Tauriel examined Ori over the lid of her mug. “What’s he like?” 

“What’s who like?” Ori looked cornered as if they were going to attack him over coffee. 

“Thorin,” Sigrid gestured vaguely. “The boys don’t talk about him much and we really only see him at family dinners.” 

“Really?” Ori softened. “That’s...I didn’t realize. He mentions them all the time. He makes it sound like they’re always talking.” 

“They don’t around us,” Tauriel shrugged. “As far as Thorin and Dis are concerned, we’re not quite family. Certainly not in the circle of trust.” 

“That’s not really fair,” Sigrid protested, but tellingly left the thought there. “How’d you two get together?” 

“Oh, you know,” Ori ran his thumb over the rim of his mug. “he commissioned me to write that speech for him. We got to know each other pretty well.” 

“That was months ago and you never let on,” Tauriel raised an eyebrow. “That was some secret to keep.” 

“There never seemed to be a good time to tell Kili,” Ori sighed. “He’s going to be pissed, isn’t he?” 

“Fili knew,” Sigrid confessed. 

“What?” Tauriel looked scandalized. 

“Thorin sort of told him,” she shrugged. “I guess there was that extra layer of awkwardness to clear up...”

“What extra-” Tauriel stopped, then coughed. “I’d forgotten.” 

“I hadn’t,” Ori rubbed a hand over his face. 

“Wait, so why is Fili having a conniption now?” Tauriel frowned. 

“He isn’t,” Sigrid sighed. “He’s letting Kili have his and glowering as back up.” 

“So it’s about Kili?” Ori forehead wrinkled. 

“Oh, it’s about Fili too,” Sigrid rolled her eyes, “because it’s still upsetting and it’s easier to just be angry.” 

“I’m confused,” Ori threw up his hands. 

“Durin boys,” Tauriel clucked her tongue. “Crazy, the whole lot of them.” 

Eventually Tauriel slipped outside to liberate some of the cake, leaving Sigrid and Ori in the dying light. 

“We’re going to be seeing a lot more of each other now,” Sigrid said before the silence became awkward. “As long as you’re in Thorin’s life, you’re in ours.” 

“I know,” Ori shifted uncomfortably. “I’m not...ugh. It’s fine. You’ve always been very nice to me and I’ve been weird. I’m sorry.” 

“It’s a weird situation,” her hand rested on the curve of her belly. “But you’ll have the boys reminding you of that often enough. I don’t care. I never did. I didn’t expect Fili to marry me in a white dress or anything.” 

“Oh!” Ori giggled despite himself. “That’s an image.” 

“He would’ve made a lovely bride,” she agreed with a smile. “My point is that it was all a really long time ago. I’ve never cared about it, but it always seemed like you did.” 

“Suppose I was jealous. When both of your best friends nails the love of his life when you’re still in high school, it sets up some unreasonable expectations for how your life will go.” 

“I dated a nightmare in high school. Fili’s no saint, but he’s an angel compared to Rich. I can’t imagine if I’d spent my life with him.” 

“Yeah, but you didn’t marry his uncle.” 

“True,” she wrinkled her nose, “but I only met his Uncle once and he was a nasty piece of work. Thorin is good looking, at least.” 

“Do you think so?” Ori smiled shyly. “I mean, I think he is, but Legolas-” 

“Don’t get me started on Legolas,” Sigrid rolled her eyes. “I’ve got no patience for him.” 

“He’s not...okay he’s awful even when you get to know him, but in a very good sort of way,” Ori sipped his coffee. “It sounded like they were shouting about a lot more than me out there.” 

“Oh, well,” Sigrid smiled tightly. “family, right? It’s never about one thing. It’s about working too hard for too little. It’s about having an Uncle instead of a father most of the time. It’s about Erebor and the auto shop and neglect and love.” 

“Kili used to talk about Thorin like he was a hero.” 

“Yeah. But heroes make for lousy company.” 

“I like his company,” Ori said staunchly. 

“Sure, but he didn’t raise you,” she sighed. “Oh, don’t listen to me anyway. I never know what to make of him. If you like him and he makes you happy, then you’re welcome into the cabal as far as I’m concerned. 

“There’s a cabal?” 

“I like to think of it more as a society,” Tauriel set down three hefty slices of cake. “Like the Daughters of the Revolution. We’re the Partners of Durins.” 

“I’ll eat to that,” Sigrid lifted her fork in lieu of a glass. 

Tauriel brandished hers and eyed Ori. He leaned in and the three of them clicked the tines together. After that, Ori cropped up at their unofficial gatherings, never a permanent installation, but a reliable enough third. If they need a fourth for poker, then Legolas came along too and brought with him a far better class of wine. 

In the heart of winter, Sigrid turned over with a sigh and sat up in bed. 

“Wake up, love,” she nudged him. 

“What is it?” He rolled over, curling around her waist. 

“I’m in labor.” 

Though it was barely cresting 3AM, Tauriel and Kili were there practically before the intake forms were filled out. 

“It could be hours,” Sigrid protested when Tauriel took up a chair at her bedside. 

“I’ve already called out sick, you’re stuck with me. And I’ve got Kili running interference for everyone else that’s going to want to barge in here.” 

“No one,” Sigrid reached out, clasping Tauriel’s hand. “You and Fili, but no one else. Especially not my father.” 

“What about your sister?” 

“No. She doesn’t have to see this. She doesn’t need to know yet.”

“Tilda isn’t a child.” 

“She is to me,” Sigrid said fiercely. 

So it was Tauriel and Fili until the very end, when even Tauriel was banished outside as she left, she saw Fili lean in close and whisper into Sigrid’s ear. 

“Everything alright?” Kili was on his feet when he spotted her and Tauriel just nodded. “Are you alright?” 

“Yes,” she sat down in a hard chair, grateful as he crowded in beside her, so she could her head on his shoulder. “I’m just tired.” 

“I know,” Kili kissed her forhead, “I know.” 

She didn’t ask him if he regretted their choice. They’d had the conversation enough times to know that he both did and didn’t, just like her. In the sterile, too full waiting room, Tauriel let go of her grief. She had family enough now and she’d be the exact kind of aunt she wanted to be. That was good. That was perfect. 

“Hello,” Fili emerged into the waiting room an hour and a half later, hair sweat plastered to his forehead and a smile that threatened to crack his face in two. “Thain Bard Durin, eight pounds and full head of black hair.” 

A ragged cheer circled around the room and Fili watched them all with tired satisfaction. After brief visits with mother and babe, most of the rabble cleared out. 

“You should hold him,” Sigrid said to Kili.  
“Hm?” Kili stared at Thain with stunned amazement. “What, now?” 

Tauriel would treasure her husband’s expression as he cradled his nephew for the rest of her days. Kili kissed the tip of the baby’s nose and met Tauriel’s eyes with his own bright and wet. 

“None of that,” Fili teased. “Don’t teach him Durin sentimentality so soon.” 

“I cried the day you were born and it doesn’t seem to have damaged you,” Thorin said from the doorway. He looked exhausted and rumpled, an incongruously sparkling blue bag in one hand. There had been a business meeting, halfway across the country, Tauriel dimly remembered. She’d sent out text dutifully, but without much faith in his arrival. 

“You didn’t,” Fili denied. 

“I did,” Thorin put his hand on Kili’s shoulder, peering down at the baby. “What’s more I did it all over again the first time your mother put Kili in my hands. You don’t get used to it.” 

“He looks a little like you,” Kili’s voice wavered. “Don’t you think?” 

“He looks a little like you,” Thorin corrected. “I didn’t think I’d...it’s good. To see you an uncle now. Do better than I did.” 

Kili swallowed hard and nodded. Thorin turned to Fili and embraced him. The hug was tight and long. Some fevered whispered conversation passed between them. When they parted, both of them looked a little wet around the eye. 

“You make a lovely mother,” Thorin leaned over the hospital bed and put a paternal kiss to Sigrid’s forehead. 

“Thank you,” she smiled bemusedly at him. 

“And Tauriel,” Thorin swept his gaze of her. Out of habit, she squared her shoulders and stood up straight. “Thank you for telling me. I was worried I wouldn’t be here in time.” 

“Oh, no problem,” she said lightly. 

“You’ll be a fine aunt,” he smiled and pat her arm just once. “I’ll leave you all to rest, but if you need a hand, I have changed a few diapers in my time.” 

“That’s what Mom said,” Fili laughed. 

“Ask her who was better at it,” Thorin said slyly and then was gone as swiftly as he’d come. 

“Look at that, little prince,” Kili grinned at the baby. “That’s your Aunt Tauriel speechless. Enjoy it now, it doesn’t happen often.” 

“Don’t tell our nephew lies,” Tauriel chided. 

“Give me back my son,” Sigrid held out her arms. “So Tauriel can slap you.” 

“Encouraging domestic abuse too,” Fili clicked his tongue. “This parenting business has gone downhill very quickly.” 

“Thorin left his gift behind,” Fili plucked up the blue bag while Kili carefully handed the baby back over.

“What is it?” Sigrid asked around a yawn. 

Fili reached inside and pulled a card. He frowned and opened it, reading the contents twice, then sitting down hard. 

“What is it?” Sigrid demanded. “Fili, what is it?” 

“He said it was Ori’s idea in the note. Just that. Like it was a whim or something. It’s a trust fund,” Fili laughed weakly. “One-seventh of Erebor’s profits will be put aside for Thain. The first-quarter was already deposited.” 

“The mines are barely in business yet,” Kili frowned. “How much could that be?” 

Fili tipped the card toward him and Kili’s eyes went round. 

“He’ll never want for anything,” Fili reached out and stroked a finger down Thain’s face. “Not ever.” 

“He wouldn’t have anyway,” Sigrid kissed Fili’s cheek. “Not with this family.” 

The next time the Society met, Thain was an honorary member. He considerately slept through most of it. Tauriel coerced Kili into baking a pie and Ori conjured fresh squeezed orange juice to replace the wine. 

“We’ve been talking about buying a house,” Sigrid mentioned as the pie steadily disappeared. “Something with a yard.” 

“I know a Victorian that could use some work that’s going on sale,” Ori had his knitting out, needles clicking gamely away. “Our lease is up and the owner wants to move to Florida. Legolas and Gimli found a new place. Condo by the water.” 

“Where are you going to live?” Tauriel asked. 

“Oh,” Ori grinned down at his work. “I’m moving in with Thorin. He offered and...yes.” 

“That’s great!” Sigrid said with a quiet cheer. “You must be happy.” 

“Thrilled,” he stilled his needles, “I was serious about the house though. There’s even a pretty nice apartment in basement with a dedicated entrance. You could rent it out for extra money and live in the rest of it.” 

“I wouldn’t want to live with strangers,” Sigrid frowned. 

“Right,” Tauriel agreed. “Not with the baby.” 

The same thought occurred to them at the same time. Their eyes met. 

“How much was it selling for?” Tauriel asked Ori without looking away from Sigrid’s spreading smile. 

The Society gained a headquarters on the first day of summer and there it flourished for many years to come.

**Author's Note:**

> This, for now at least, ends the Durin's Auto Body series. Thank you all for coming along on the journey. If you yearn for more, I often open myself up for prompts on my tumbler: dragonmuse.tumblr.com


End file.
